We'll find out when Obama decrees any business accepting food stamps has to pay its workers $15 per hour plus a free rainbow flag on Harvey Milk's birthday. If they go along, they're addicted to welfare.

what_now:I love that we're picking on Wal Mart and not that other huge employer who's employees are often on food stamps because the pay is so low: The US Armed Forces.

Junior enlisted paygrades are low in pay because they're expected to be trainees. When you enlist with a few kids, or enlist and then knock up the first girl that bats her eyes at you in an off-base bar you're going to struggle. However, advancement is fairly regular early on and there are always time-in-service pay raises. Furthermore, military families get free healthcare, subsidized groceries, tax-free housing and subsistence allowances, or they get base housing. Yes some junior enlisted personnel with kids end up using SNAP, but they are not the general case unlike Wal-Mart.

They pay their employees too little to live to they have to live off food stamps at taxpayer expense then these same employees go and purchase food from walmart with the food stamps so they get a double benefit, slave wage labor that wouldn't exist without taxpayer subsidizing them and the food stamps themselves.

Walmarts wages are above minimum. Typically 50 people show up to apply for every position.

The Other thing is that if that money were not being taxed or borrowed out of the economy, it would still exist....and it would still create economic activity. The fact that Obama is trying to funnel as much of the economy through the Government as possible to create dependence is the real topic here.

Perhaps some of those people could find jobs if we didnt have 38 Trillion dollars per year in Economic activity being prevented by regulation. Wages for the bottom 30% of Americas workforce represent something like a Trillion dollars of the GDP....so merely reducing targeted regulation by 3% could double those workers wages through normal economic forces like supply and demand.

But liberals wont do that because it is more important for them to have control than it is for the lower class to double its wealth.

It's sort of like a national version of the company store. You get your food stamps from the government because Walmart doesn't pay you enough to eat, and then you spend your food stamps at Walmart because they drove out all the other grocers because they don't pay people enough to eat.

If you're in favor of large corporations paying sub-standard wages you're also in favor of your tax dollars going towards welfare to fill in the gap between those wages and a living wage, whether or notyou are smart enough to understand it or honest enough to admit it. Well the third option is you're a sociopath who says "f*ck em" but one usually hopes that sociopaths don't get to drive policy.

Rwa2play:Y-you mean the Republicans cunning plan to starve the country is coming back to bite the ass of one of it's bigger benefactors?

Yes. Without doubling of the foid stamp program under obama, americans were going to starve to death. A 4% cut after an 80% growth is certain death. Ignore the fact that fraud and abuse was larger than the estimated cuts, starvation would be the result.

Carn:If you're in favor of large corporations paying sub-standard wages you're also in favor of your tax dollars going towards welfare to fill in the gap between those wages and a living wage, whether or notyou are smart enough to understand it or honest enough to admit it. Well the third option is you're a sociopath who says "f*ck em" but one usually hopes that sociopaths don't get to drive policy.

There is nothing more communist than capitalist America. I first noticed this when McDonald's was handing out uniforms and stars to employees in the seventies and enforced sameness across locations, outfits and product. it hasn't changed since then.American capitalists are the big equalizers: We are all the same just not before the government but before our corporate gods.

Walmarts wages are above minimum. Typically 50 people show up to apply for every position.

The Other thing is that if that money were not being taxed or borrowed out of the economy, it would still exist....and it would still create economic activity. The fact that Obama is trying to funnel as much of the economy through the Government as possible to create dependence is the real topic here.

Perhaps some of those people could find jobs if we didnt have 38 Trillion dollars per year in Economic activity being prevented by regulation. Wages for the bottom 30% of Americas workforce represent something like a Trillion dollars of the GDP....so merely reducing targeted regulation by 3% could double those workers wages through normal economic forces like supply and demand.

But liberals wont do that because it is more important for them to have control than it is for the lower class to double its wealth.

what_now:I love that we're picking on Wal Mart and not that other huge employer who's employees are often on food stamps because the pay is so low: The US Armed Forces.

My other love is that the mention of "walmart is often the largest private employer with the most employees on government assistance" in these articles. What's usually left out, state employees are number 1 in many cases. But, state employees make too much, right?

what_now:I love that we're picking on Wal Mart and not that other huge employer who's employees are often on food stamps because the pay is so low: The US Armed Forces.

Welcome to America. Pretty much all service member's wives work, like everyone else in the working class, and when they get laid off, they wind up on food stamps. The pay structure is set up for new recruits who are 18 and single; married service members with dependents get some additional bennies like a housing allowance, but it's not enough to make up for the additional expense.

Still, an E-1 makes more than $18,000 a year in base pay alone; that's the equivalent of $9 per hour. Not bad money for an 18-year-old with only a high school diploma, and if you make your expected promotions, you can retire in 20 years when you'll be making over $50k per year in base pay. And if you're married and living, say, in Mobile, AL, you get an extra $1,000 a month as an E-1 for housing. So that's $30k per year, or the equivalent of $15 an hour. The housing allowance goes up with rank, just like pay, and promotion up to E-3 is basically automatic.

America's troops are not underpaid, but some of them have more expenses than they can afford on one fairly decent wage.

hinten:There is nothing more communist than capitalist America. I first noticed this when McDonald's was handing out uniforms and stars to employees in the seventies and enforced sameness across locations, outfits and product. it hasn't changed since then.American capitalists are the big equalizers: We are all the same just not before the government but before our corporate gods.

Under a capitalist system, man exploits man.under a communist one, its just the opposite. --renowned american economist john kenneth gabraith.

Mrs.Sharpier:Wal-Mart CEOs, Presidents and Board of Directors should have to undergo drug tests every month. Also, they shouldn't spend their billions on lobster, cigarettes or soda.

Rep Paul Ryan is going to have a field day going after Wal-Mart! Right?

Hillary Clinton was the first woman on the Board of Directors. She was integral to the growth and direction of Walmart... and helped make it what it is today. We should be glad to have such a successful company that grew from humble beginnings in the South. With a little help from some key politicians.

LazyMedia:what_now: I love that we're picking on Wal Mart and not that other huge employer who's employees are often on food stamps because the pay is so low: The US Armed Forces.

Welcome to America. Pretty much all service member's wives work, like everyone else in the working class, and when they get laid off, they wind up on food stamps. The pay structure is set up for new recruits who are 18 and single; married service members with dependents get some additional bennies like a housing allowance, but it's not enough to make up for the additional expense.

Still, an E-1 makes more than $18,000 a year in base pay alone; that's the equivalent of $9 per hour. Not bad money for an 18-year-old with only a high school diploma, and if you make your expected promotions, you can retire in 20 years when you'll be making over $50k per year in base pay. And if you're married and living, say, in Mobile, AL, you get an extra $1,000 a month as an E-1 for housing. So that's $30k per year, or the equivalent of $15 an hour. The housing allowance goes up with rank, just like pay, and promotion up to E-3 is basically automatic.

America's troops are not underpaid, but some of them have more expenses than they can afford on one fairly decent wage.

I dunno, I think we should pay those guys a bit more than that. I know they get hazard pay (they do get hazard pay right?!?!?) when deployed, but they should be getting a bit more given the risk they are assumed to be taking.

It might save us money in the long run to pay them more. The increase in GDP might be worth it all by itself.